Of Course There’s No Evidence

The hospital ward fell silent. The faint smell of sanitizer in the air felt almost like the fragrance of flower. It was rather refreshing.

Yang Chen and Ruoxi’s gazes converged and turned into ripples.

After a long pause, Lin Ruoxi furrowed her brows. Her gaze was gentle as she grumbled, “What is all this about digging your heart and cutting into slices all of a sudden? It sounds so crude. Can’t you make it sound a little nicer?”

Yang Chen rubbed the back of his head and curled his lips while saying, “Take it as ‘a filthy mouth that can’t utter decent language’. Would you be willing to listen to me even if I put it nicely? Might as well just make it sound more exciting.”

As he said so, Yang Chen grabbed the cup of water that he had put on the table just now and passed it to Lin Ruoxi again. “Rinse your mouth, and drink some water. You’ve only just recovered. Although you’re mostly fine now, it’s still better to get some rest.”

Lin Ruoxi took the cup of water and slowly moved to get down the bed, saying, “There’s still a lot of matters I have to deal with. I’ll tidy myself up a little and go back to work. I’m fine now.”

Yang Chen let out a long sigh. “I knew that you wouldn’t listen.”

“I’m alright. You should turn on your phone and find a way to solve Mingyu’s problem.” Lin Ruoxi glanced at Yang Chen with a faint smile on her face. Then she went to the restroom to wash up.

Although Yang Chen couldn’t bear to see her start working again, he also knew that after channeling True Yuan into her body, despite still being weak, Lin Ruoxi would recover quickly. Work shouldn’t be an issue. Furthermore, without her acting as the brain of Yu Lei, it would be very difficult for the company to progress any further. Thus he did not impose his expectations on her.

Turning on his phone, Yang Chen immediately saw a few missed calls on the screen, including the ones from Molin, Mo Qianni, An Xin, and Wu Yue.

Yang Chen was just about to call Molin to ask how things were going when his phone started ringing. It was Mo Qianni.

He picked up the phone and Mo Qianni started saying worriedly, “You’ve finally switched on your phone. Yang Chen, are you with Ruoxi at the hospital? How is she now? Is she in danger?”

Yang Chen said smilingly, “Don’t worry. She’s fine now. I’ll send her back to the company in a while. Why did you call me so many times? Is it just to ask about Ruoxi’s body condition?”

Mo Qianni replied in frustration, “I’m on the verge of a breakdown. After such an incident to the company, the mainstream media have approached us, asking us to explain the situation. But just now, someone leaked the news and now all the reporters know that our CEO has fallen sick. Those reporters have completely surrounded the compounds of our company. And they’re coming up with all sorts of ridiculous conspiracy theories in their news. I think if Ruoxi is fine, it’s better if she comes back as soon as possible. The employees have all lost their direction upon hearing that the news. When the stock market reopens, it will be the last punch needed to knock us out. We’ll really be done for then.”

Some emergency situation seemed to have occurred at Mo Qianni’s side again. There was a clamor, and it sounded like something was being reported. Mo Qianni had no choice but to excuse herself and hang up the phone.

Yang Chen let out a bitter smile and shook his head. Then, he dialed Molin’s number.

“Molin, how’s the analysis and investigation that I made you do?” Yang Chen asked.

Molin sounded a little embarrassed as he said, “Your Majesty Pluto, I’m very sorry. Li Minghe’s background is slightly too complicated. I can’t compile anything of substance just yet. I need a bit more time. But as for the two things that you asked us to analyze, we’ve already gotten the result.”

Yang Chen frowned. “Complicated? Li Minghe is just a managerial employee that was sent over by Hong Kong’s Muyun Corporation. He’s at most just a distant relative of the Li clan from Hong Kong. Why would information about him be difficult to obtain?”

“Actually...” Molin said, “I thought so too initially. But according to the information that I’ve gathered so far, Li Minghe is not his actual name. He seems to have changed his name after he started working in Hong Kong. Besides, Li Minghe seems to have no connection to Muyun’s Li clan at all. Their common surname is their only tie. This is what misled our investigations at first. His resume appears very fishy too. Lots of the content have been altered. Clearing things up might take some time. It’s difficult to explain it clearly now. I hope that Your Majesty can give me a little more time. I guarantee you that I’ll complete the task.”

Yang Chen did not expect so many problems to arise upon investigating Li Minghe’s background. But, without a doubt, this also meant that matters were much more mysterious than what he had expected.

“What about the evidence that I made you investigate then? How is it?” Yang Chen asked again.

This time round, Molin replied rather confidently, “We’ve already gotten the results. There is poison in that coffee indeed. It is a substance similar to ‘tannin’ that can be found in tea leaves. When this kind of acid is combined with a certain extract from animal protein, for example a substance in the proteins of dogs, it will produce a type of carcinogen that destroys humans’ internal organs.

“This cup of coffee contained not just tannin, but also some unique protein that usually isn’t found in coffee. We can say that this cup of coffee was made with the intention of causing harm to its drinker.

“But since it takes a long time to accumulate this kind of poison before it can yield a strong effect when it’s triggered, hence according to my deduction, the person who put in the poison in must be familiar with the victim of the coffee. The culprit added the extract into the coffee in a well-planned manner according to how much the drinker usually drinks. Although I can’t deduce the exact time of the first disease onset, but according to my estimation based on the ratio, I estimate about one week ago.”

Listening up to this point, a thick killing intent had already emerged in Yang Chen’s eyes. He thought to himself, To think that Ruoxi has been drinking coffee that contains chronic toxin all this while! Regardless of whether Li Minghe did this behind Wu Yue’s back, I can’t let Wu Yue continue being Lin Ruoxi’s assistant anymore. Even if it means I have to kill her.

“As for the thing that you mentioned,” Molin continued, “Just like what you said, it was indeed tampered with. But it is a little insufficient to be presented as an evidence…”

By the time Molin was almost done explaining, Lin Ruoxi had also finished washing up and stepped out of the restroom. Seeing that Yang Chen was on the phone, she asked softly, “Is there anything urgent?”

Yang Chen was already done with the call, so he hung up and said smilingly, “The company needs you back quickly. The reporters have already blocked the entire entrance. Let’s go.”

A worried look flashed across Lin Ruoxi’s face, and she just nodded her head.

On the way back to Yu Lei International, Yang Chen called An Xin back as well. She was just concerned if something had happened, so she didn’t say much upon learning that everything was fine.

Lin Ruoxi sat on the front passenger seat and pondered for a while. Then, she turned to her to Yang Chen and asked, “Have they found out who the culprit is yet? Who’s the one that stole the documents from Mingyu’s office?”

With one hand on the steering wheel, Yang Chen shook his finger at Lin Ruoxi with his other hand. A malicious smile appeared on his face as he said, “This culprit is very cunning indeed. We’ve all been cheated by him even since the beginning.”

“What do you mean?” Lin Ruoxi couldn’t quite understand.

Yang Chen heaved out a sigh and said, “The thief didn’t steal anything from Mingyu’s office. He managed to collect all the information via other means.”

Yang Chen explained patiently, “Since the start, we have been focusing on the security safe in Mingyu’s office. And that’s because there were only two copies of the document. As the CEO, it’s only natural that you wouldn’t benefit from leaking the documents. That’s why everyone assumed that Mingyu was the one who did it.

“With that, our line of thought was focused on things like what kind of person could find the opportunity to lay their hands on the documents kept by Mingyu, or what kind of person would have a way of decrypting the passcode. We even suspected if the thief installed a high-tech pinhole camera in Mingyu’s office to monitor her when she opens the safe.”

Lin Ruoxi asked, “Isn’t that how it is? If it isn’t from Mingyu’s office, I can almost guarantee that it did not come from my office. Apart from Wu Yue, almost no one else can enter my office. Plus the area around the safe in my office is totally empty. There’s no way of installing a pinhole camera there.”

Yang Chen smiled and said, “Let me finish. Actually, even I fell into the culprit’s trap. They came well prepared. He probably understands me very well even before he started the plan, or, we could say that he did many things to confuse us beforehand.

“The culprit has been visiting Mingyu’s office very frequently and diligently in the past two to three months. And the visits often seem to be without any proper reason or motive. He made sure that not only people like me who visit Mingyu’s office only occasionally noticed his behavior, but even the other employees noticed and became curious about the relationship between him and Mingyu.

“Don’t tell me that you have no idea who the person is. You would have definitely suspected him to be the one to have stolen the documents. And that’s why you let me investigate it, right?”

Lin Ruoxi did not deny. She nodded and said, “You’re talking about Li Minghe. I am aware that he has been visiting Mingyu’s office very frequently recently without any reason. It is not secret to the rest of the company too. I believe many other employees in the company share my suspicions. It’s just that there was no evidence to prove that he was the one who stole the documents. And this is also why no one brought up his name during the meeting. Because no one had any evidence.”

“Of course there’s no evidence,” Yang Chen shook his head with a smile and said, “I even went to check the surveillance footage, and calculated how likely he could open the safe, and how he managed to steal such a huge amount of documents without anyone noticing. Now that I think about it, it’s such a joke. This line of deduction was totally baseless. He had never once planned to steal the documents from Mingyu’s office. There is only one reason behind his actions—to attract our attention, and to make us think that he did it in Mingyu’s office.”

Lin Ruoxi was quick to catch up too, and she asked, “You mean to say that this was all a deliberate trick that he played to mislead us? Then how did he manage to steal it?”

Lynic's notes:

Chapter 5/5

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